The following is based on Chapter 1 of Frantz Fanon’s “Black Skin, White Masks” (1952): “The Black Man and Language”:
Fanon grew up in Martinque, an island in the Caribbean ruled by France. The capital of France, Paris, was the metropole, the centre of the empire. Martinique was the bush, the outback, the hinterland, a nowhere kind of place. All the top people in Martinique either came from France or received their university education there. They all spoke in perfect French.
But most black people in Martinique did not: they spoke Creole, a dialect of French noted for its swallowed r’s. Its closest counterpart in America is Ebonics. Everyone is taught to look down on it at school. The middle-class tries not to speak it at all – except to servants – and shame their children out of using it.
People in Martinique found Creole wanting and saw French as better. That comes not from scholarly opinion but from being colonized, from being under French rule.
Fanon noticed that when people came back from France after receiving their university education they would speak in painfully perfect French and act as if they no longer knew Creole. Why was that?
Fanon found out first-hand: in France white people talk down to you if you are black. Either they speak in fake pidgin French – “Why you left big savanna?” – or they would act too familiar, calling you old fellow and so on. French doctors, for example, would talk to their white patients with impersonal respect but to blacks and Arabs like they were their old friend or something.
The whites say that they are just trying to make blacks feel comfortable. Fanon says no, they are scumbags trying to keep blacks in their place – as perpetual children, as beings of a lesser mind. He noticed they talked to blacks the same way he talked to retarded patients.
So under such circumstances students from Martinique make it a point to speak perfect French, complete with all the r’s. Not because they want to be white or because they think white people are better or something – but to prove they are the equal of any white Frenchman, to deny whites the satisfaction of looking down on them because of their French. (And, admittedly, because French opens doors to opportunities that Creole simply cannot.)
And yet even if you speak perfect French the racism does not stop: white people will then say stuff like, “You speak such perfect French!” – something they never say to a white person with the same university education. Or they will say of one of your country’s writers, “Here is a black man who handles the French language unlike any white man today.” As if that is a surprise or something.
But then mastering perfect French puts black students in a bind: “To speak a language is to appropriate its world and culture,” says Fanon. Through learning to speak perfect French, they have unwittingly become culturally whiter.
See also:
I had a brief glance at the chapter again – The Negro and Language.
From a brief glance. Fanon seems to suggest the Black man at that time was in a contradiction. Since s/he is always striving towards Europen Culture to the point that there is a concern to master the ‘coloniser’s language’ even to the point that one can speak it properly (ie like a proper Frenchman, and talk about things that is related to France ec0. And to frown upon anyone who cannot speak in this manner (ie the natives)
However, their is a contradiction for the Black who can speak as eloquently as the French man and that is no matter how well, Blacks learn to master the language whether in Martinique, or anywhere in the world they will be viewed as subservient and furthermore it will draw the attention of ‘White people’, sinc ehis mastery of language is not in keeping with the masses.
The chapter shows the importance of language and how colonisers will force their language on the colonised.
It is through the process of language that we form our very ideas of the world. In writing this my mind for some unknown reason goes back to Greece in Egypt, and that even today we use Greek (colonist) appendages for African names and places.
To sum up Fanon is correct to identify the use of language as a tool for liberation for the colonised.
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This pattern of talking down to blacks continues today. This dynamic is especially prevalent in the workplace where subtle codes of hierarchy are more dangerous to confront. I know that it is now politically correct to claim that whites do this unconsciously but, like Fanon, I believe much of this is a conscious act and observing this pattern of behavior can be grounds for suspecting a white person of practicing racism/white supremacy.
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The whole white people being so astounded that a black is so “well spoken” is old it needs to be retired
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French doctors, for example, would talk to their white patients with impersonal respect but to blacks and Arabs like they were their old friend or something.
This is so true! Well, I don’t know about French doctors, but I did notice the trend: people do talk down to those they consider inferior. They might be thinking they’re just trying to be friendly- but that’s a lie. Even if their intentions are honest, why don’t they talk the same manner with those they consider to be equal?
I’ve seen this happen in my country concerning Gypsies. And the very same people who treat Gypsies this way are treated as inferior in Western Europe or America if they don’t speak proper English. Then they go back, and instead of understanding, they continue to mistreat Gypsies (but don’t get why they were mistreated).
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^ Mira, is that you?
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The Fanon post is an expression of black paranoia experienced through language. Depressing.
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Speaking of depressing….
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More than depressing…How about calling the kettle black (forgive the pun ‘ere he he he )??
Here is a person who wrote about
Global Warming? How About Islamic Warning”!
I am sure this will not constitute ‘paranoia’ on the part of No_Slappz stick world of comedy ha ha ha
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Ignore no-slapps, he is a hideous little troll and keep in his cyber-hovel.
It is sad that Fanon died so young. His views on black women, sucked and who knows if he would have applied the respect he had for Arab women to his mother and sisters. I will every black student in America could read this and understand that code switching is a vital tool to have. Loving black English but speaking American English when necessary does not mean you are “acting white” we really need to get rid of the crazy internalized racism.
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Aiyo said:
It continues to this day. Let’s not forget what Obama’s right-hand man said in the during the run-up.
“I mean, you got the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy.”
Now this is in 2007, and from a guy that is a liberal democrat would later go on to become this man’s 2nd in command. And you see the condescension even from him. White people look at something like that and don’t see what the big deal is. Black people see between the lines and it’s clear that he has low standards of black people. I don’t believe Biden hates black people. Most white people don’t. But you don’t have to hate to have racist, condescending views and that’s why whites don’t understand racism. Belief in black inferiority is like the fish swimming in the water it takes for granted.
ps – I don’t know what the hell he meant with the “clean” part. Most blacks I know do shower and groom regularly. Did this just occur to Biden??
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But you don’t have to hate to have racist, condescending views and that’s why whites don’t understand racism.
Excellent point!
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Thanks for teh advice.
Personally I do not mind No_Slappz comments.
Personally I am really amused by the contradictory nature of them – from an African centred perspective off course, and yet at the same time how his views in my opinion are creating a form of ‘disonance’ within himself whilst being here.
Well that my Psycho-analysis…Thought I would try to give it a go…After all it is a Fanon post ha ha
Something interests me here since I have heard it echoed a few times.
What was Fanon’s view regarding Black women – and what were the specific arguments/words he used??
Cheers!!
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There is more than code switching. Many Black people have a definitive accent, one can speak perfect standard English, but if the accent is detected, suddenly the job has been filled or the apartment rented, etc. When some Blacks don’t speak with the accent, it gets a little sticky when they show up in person. On occasion they wil say you don’t speak like a Black person.
Most American white people don’t even know if you are speaking standard English, because they don’t speak it. If they are southern, there has been so much of the intermingling of culture, that some white people speak ebonics, but with a different accent. Also southerners, Black or white, if they have a heavy southern accent are thought to be slow in other regions of the US.
Then are those who are recent immigrants which speak English using the form of their native language.
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OK, just acting the Devil’s advocate here to provoke discussion…
When Brazilians say to me “Oh, you speak Portuguese so well, almost as good as a real Brazilian”, are they being racist?
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Thad,
The difference is you are a guy who just moved to Brazil, a gringo. Blacks have been speaking English in America for hundreds of years, and Francophone blacks in the Caribbean have been speaking French as long. I think a Brazilian analogy would be some white upper crust Brazilians being surprised that a black Brazilian spoke perfect Portuguese.
If a French reacted that way to my French knowing that I’m an American, then I wouldn’t consider that condescending, most Americans don’t speak French, so it would be a genuine surprise. Just like most people don’t speak Portuguese unless the’ve spent some time in a Portuguese-speaking country.
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@tulio
I think Biden meant clean as in no criminal record or something like that. I remember reading a post on swpd about white people are focus on how black person is saying something and do not focus on what they are saying.
It’s like the first episode of The Boondocks when Huey tells white people “the truth” and instead of being shocked they applaud him for how articulate he is (you know for a black person)
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There are some other interesting points that Fanon raises in this chapter. He says:
“The Black man who arrives in France changes because to him the country represents the ‘Tabernacle; he changes not only because it is from France that he received his knowledge of Montesquieu, Rousseau and Voltaire, but also because France gave him his physicians…
…What is the origin of this personality change? What is the source of this new way of being?…And the fact that the [Black man] adopts a language different from that of the group into which he is born (ie trying to speak French like a French man etc) is evidence of a dislocation, a separation. Proff D. Westermann, in The African today (p.331) says that the [Blacks] inferiority complex is particular intensified amongst the most educated, who must struggle with it unceasingly.
Their way of doing so, he adds is frequently naive: The wearing of European clothes, whether rags or the most up-to-date style; using European furniture and European forms of social intercourse adorning the Native language with European expressions; using bombastic phrases in speaking or writing a European language, all these contribute to a feeling of equality with the European and his achievements.
I have known – and unfortunately I still know – people in born in Dahomey or the Congo who pretend to be natives of the [French Caribbean]; I have known, and I still know [French Caribbeans] who are annoyed when they are suspected of being Sengalese.
This is because the [French Caribbeans] are more ‘civilised’ than the African, that is, he is closer to the White man… I was talking recently with someone from Martinique who told me with considerable reentment that some Gaudeloupe Blacks were trying to ‘pass’ as ‘Martinicans. But, he added the lie was rapidly discovered, because they are more savage than we are, which again means farthe away from the white man…”
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@J
That’s really interesting because a similar dynamic happened in the UK there was sort of a rift between Africans and Carribeans. I think it has been settled but I could be wrong in my experience it is better though.
I remember back in High school there was this girl who would always make fun of Africans (she was Jamican) and would go on about how Carribeans were better and how they are light skinned. Basically she was happy for the white and native blood that saved her from being ugly *rolls eyes* now she is dating a nigerian guy.
I mean you can go on facebook and look at this crap it’s ridiculous and stupid I remember SOME carribeans would go “african boo boo” and repeat white racist crap like “savages” and “monkey” making fun of our names
African’s would go “white man’s slave” “we escaped slavery” “rape product”
I knew a few people who were african would pretend to be carribean (it was mostly the younger ones who were prentending
i have experienced more good than bad though.
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It reminds me of the following:
Amy Jacques Garvey who said:
“…in fact [Blacks] were propagandised into believing that they had no common cause. The American Blacks from their side-walk jungles called the Africans at home ‘heathen and uncivilised cannibals’, and the West indians were called ‘Monkey chasers’, living in trees.
The Africans called all the Western World Blacks ex-slaves – a term of contempt.
Each unit was taught to stigmatise the other. The ‘divide and rule ‘ methods wrought havoc in all their simple undesigning minds. Then came the awakening by Marcus Garvey – ‘Up Mighty Race!’ We have to carry out our rightful heritage…
And again Malcolm X commenting on Africa and self-hate:
“…You have to realize that up until 1959 Africa was dominated by the colonial powers. Having complete control over Africa, the colonial powers of Europe projected the image of Africa negatively. They always project Africa in a negative light: jungle savages, cannibals, nothing civilized.
Why then, naturally it was so negative that it was negative to you and me, and you and I began to hate it. We didn’t want anybody telling us anything about Africa, much less calling us Africans.
In hating Africa and in hating the Africans, we ended up hating ourselves, without even realizing it. Because you can’t hate the roots of a tree, and not hate the tree. You can’t hate your origin and not end up hating yourself. You can’t hate Africa and not hate yourself.
You show me one of these people over here who has been thoroughly brainwashed and has a negative attitude toward Africa, and I’ll show you one who has a negative attitude toward himself.
You can’t have a positive toward yourself and a negative attitude toward Africa at the same time.
To the same degree that your understanding of and attitude toward become positive, you’ll find that your understanding of and your toward yourself will also become positive. And this is what the white man knows. So they very skillfully make you and me hate our African identity, our African characteristics. You know yourself that we have been a people who hated our African characteristics.
We hated our heads, we hated the shape of our nose, we wanted one of those long doglike noses, you know; we hated the color of our skin, hated the blood of Africa that was in our veins. And in hating our features and our skin and our blood, why, we had to end up hating ourselves. And we hated ourselves.
Our color became to us a chain–we felt that it was holding us back; our color became to us like a prison which we felt was keeping us confined, not letting us go this way or that way.
We felt all of these restrictions were based solely upon our color, and the psychological reaction to that would have to be that as long as we felt imprisoned or chained or trapped by black skin, black features, and black blood, that skin and those features and that blood holding us back automatically had to become hateful to us.
And it became hateful to us. It made us feel inferior; it made us feel inadequate made us feel helpless. And when we fell victims to this feeling of inadequacy or inferiority or helplessness, we turned to somebody else to show us the way.
We didn’t have confidence in another black man to show us the way, or black people to show us the way. In those days we didn’t. We didn’t think a man could do anything except play some horns–you know, make sound and make you happy with some songs and in that way.
But in serious things, where our food, clothing, shelter, and education were concerned, we turned to the man. We never thought in terms of bringing these things into existence for ourselves, we never thought in terms of doing for ourselves. Because we felt helpless.
What made us feel helpless was our hatred for ourselves. And our hatred for ourselves stemmed from hatred for things African…”
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J,
“But in serious things, where our food, clothing, shelter, and education were concerned, we turned to the man. We never thought in terms of bringing these things into existence for ourselves, we never thought in terms of doing for ourselves. Because we felt helpless.
What made us feel helpless was our hatred for ourselves. And our hatred for ourselves stemmed from hatred for things African…”
If all that you knew of Africa was from the “Tarzan ” movies, why would think Black people would want to be like that?
Most Black people of my generation didn’t even have the National Geographic view of Africa. Black people became more aware of African peoples when they were seeking their independence and TV, newspapers and magazines began to give some background on the emerging leaders.
I remember one of the Life’s first covers of Thomas Mboya in the mid fifties. The only exposure I had of Africa was from a geography book in forth grade. It showed people how they lived and the terrain.
She is not quite right, because the slave would have never learned to read. The slave also had skills, even were imported for some their skills. Blacks had attained the skills to be self sufficient after slavery, but during the industrial revolution, Black were seriously kept from updating themselves. For example blacksmiths turn their shops into auto repair and gas stations, but very few Blacks were able to get franchises from the Oil companies. When the horse was replaced, there went most of the Smithing business. When manufacturing and construction used the guild system of training, Blacks were not included in that either. The one thing they depended upon themselves and were successful was education. The problem was that too many Black people were educated to be professional, where not enough jobs existed.
Growing up I never felt that there was that kind of self hatred. Black people were extremely dignified and had a lot of self respect. (which I think we have lost in recent times) A lot of the aspiration toward whiteness didn’t have to do with becoming something you are not, but to gain equal citizenship. My view could be because I grew up in the south under Jim Crow.
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The stereotypes that we have of each other are ellucidated in anoher chapter of black skins/white masks. He discuses the idea of epidermal schema, which is way that blacks look at each after being assaulted by the white gaze. Putting other memebers of the African diaspora down is a way to defelect the pain and anger of white supremacy.
I hear you Hathor,I love black dialects and our ability to adapt linguistically. If the government actually enforced employment and housing laws this discrimination would be less of a problem. I wish the government would fund sting operations and fine those who refuse to employ and house black folks. Green tends to mitigate even the darkest black.
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I feel a bit like a fish out of water, and perhaps it may be inappropriate therefore to comment, since that era is well before me, nor do I live in that country, and in a way have a ‘different’ cultural tradition
However, I could not help see yet another tautology:
A lot of the aspiration toward WHITENESS = didn’t have to do with becoming SOMETHING YOU ARE NOT = but to gain
EQUAL CITIZENSHIP
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Tulio sez:
Thad,
The difference is you are a guy who just moved to Brazil, a gringo.
Tulio, I’d hazard a guess that there’s a good chance that I’ve been living in Brazil for longer than you’ve been living on planet Earth. And I am a citizen.
So check the presumptions there.
But the accent thing is interesting from a Brazilian perspective: we do not have racial accents but we do have regional and class accents.
Yes, region and class have race overtones. For example, I would expect a poor guy from Maranhão to be black. But i would expect poor people from Maranhão to speak with a given accent regardless of color. Which is why a white actor can get away with playing a poor immigrant from Maranhão.
And if you’re middle class and college educated, I would expect you to have another accent, regardless of color.
Here in Rio, we have two language families, broadly speaking: south zone/asphalt and north zone/favela. Most carioca from the middle class on up know how to speak both – or at least get by.
North zone/favela drops the plural “s” and switches “r”s and “l”s. So “Temos muito plobrema aui no Rio”.
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J, dead serious question here.
Philosophically speaking, how is Marcus Garvey’s ” ‘Up Mighty Race!’ We have to carry out our rightful heritage…” different from classical fascism, in any way, shape or form?
Meanwhile, Malcolm X was pretty clearly a black capitalist. I do not see the two as equal.
Regarding citizenship…
In the America’s, citizenship was synonymous with whiteness for so long that it’s not to wonder that cultural values valenced today as “white” are also those valenced as “good citizen”.
The lack of vision most black people have on this issue is that they presume that whiteness alone was enough for citizenship. Not so: it was a very particular form of whiteness that was hevaliy shot through with class and ethnic components. To be a citizen, one needed to be white, but not every white person was a citizen. Whiteness was thus a necessary but insufficient condition for citizenship.
In the U.S., this has lead to thus the constant denegration of white trash by blacks. What the view seems to be is the following: “Yes, I am not white. However, my BEHAVIOR is more apprpriate [read white, liberal and middle class] than that redneck’s. I am thus more deserving or rights than he.”
And this, in turn, leads the rednecks to pound their chests about a “heritage” which is not behavior but blood based.
The real argument in the U.S. isn’t black or white behavior: a certain kind of white behavior is universally recognized as “appropriate” or “correct”. The real debate is whether behavior trumps blood. This is why Obama has the white supporters that he does. They are casting their vote behind the concept that “American” means one aCTS in a certain way, no matter how one looks. The redneck hoi polloi believe that blood trumps training.
Indeed, this is what their intellectual appologists are gettting at when they talk about such crap as “Black’s innately lower IQ scores”.
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With regard to the comparison of Malcolm X and Marcus Garvey we are going over old grounds. I do not mind still…
However, to be honest I do not think there is any real difference between the two. Malcolm X before and after his conversion to orthodox Islam was essentially ‘race first’.
Personally and there is a school of thought among African centred scholars that there is an attempt by Euro-centred scholars to interpert Malcolm X from their perspective ie as being on the Left and/or a Socialist. Whereas Garvey is portrayed as a ‘facist’ etc to use your term.
It is clear you are not a fan of Garvey, as you have admitted. Even though you have NOT admitted to being a fan of Malcolm X. What I have observed is you have not said anything ill towards him, as you have done for Garvey.
This is my humble opinion, I sincerely believe that your belief system is not based in or an African centred viewpoint and this would explain some of the position you have adopted in our discussion.
There is nothing wrong with this but you have to recognise (stating the obvious here) that there will be different ‘schools of thoughts’ which are different and yet
irreconcilable.
With regard to your question. You have said that there are some who have commented upon Fanon, without reading his works. Forgive me, it seems that you appear to have done the same thing for Garvey.
It does not look as if you have read Garvey and his own words if you can compare and reduce him merely to ‘facism’.
It is very worrying, in my opinion if someone can reduce Garvey to a term like a ‘fascist’. In my opinion this speaks more of the politics of the person making the comment rather than having a holistic understanding of what ‘Garveyism’ represented.
Finally, with regard to Obama, I think he is what Fanon classically described as the White Skin Black Mask’ in my opinion.
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Correction…
This should read
Finally, with regard to Obama, I think he is what Fanon classically described as the Black Skin White Mask’ in my opinion
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Well, as I said, I interpret Malcolm X as a died-in-the-wool CAPITALIST, not a socialist, so I’m unsure where you’re getting the idea that “Malcolm is a socialist” from.
Perhaps it’s that old devil, American binary thinking…? 😀
Garvey seems fascist to me not because I set the world in opposed binary dualities, but because his fundamental points are spot on with regards to the philosophy of fascism.
Would you like me to enumerate these for you or are you aware of what fascism was, on a philosophical level? Most Americans aren’t, so I have to ask.
No, my viewpoint is NOT based on an exclusively African center, my friend – but then again, neither is yours, in spite of all the pretty rhetoric to the contrary.
BtW, the view that garveyism has more than a little in common with fascism isn’t mine: it’s Gilroy’s. And in both cases, it is based on what the core beliefs of both thought systems were.
But before we get into that, what do you understand to be the core beliefs of fascism? I have a very clear set of them in my head when I make the comparison with Garvey. This is not a simple “red vs. blue” rhetorical point for me.
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Thanks!!
I do not see Garvey as a fascist – unless you define someone whose main objective was to help the Black race and perhaps did more than any leader globally to impact that change…
With regard to the issue of facism my view of it is a state as represented by an individual whose interest is to oppress another nation. So with regard to ethiopia, you colonise their land and you drop mustard gas on the populace.
Whatever, may be said of Garvey he did not commit such acts, nor can he compared to prompting Blacks to commit such acts of genocide etc.
As for Paul Gilroy, his politics is not based on an ‘african centred’ perspective nor ‘race first’ principle,as I alluded to previously. By the way Gilroy was not the first to espouse this.
I am interested in your views when you suggest that my thoughts are not African centred.
WIth regard to Malcom X being a capatalist not even the most ‘Euro centred’ scholars would say this.
They would say that NOI as created by the Hon Elijah Muhammad was based upon capitalism, but not Malcolm X, who gave speeches at Socialist rallies.
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Forgive me for butting in and not giving you the chance to make a comment…
With regard to:
“BtW, the view that garveyism has more than a little in common with fascism isn’t mine: it’s Gilroy’s. And in both cases, it is based on what the core beliefs of both thought systems were.
But before we get into that, what do you understand to be the core beliefs of fascism? I have a very clear set of them in my head when I make the comparison with Garvey”
Against Race: Imagining Political Culture Beyond The Color Line By Paul Gilroy
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=wWpt-Js7JPEC&pg=PA232&lpg=PA232&dq=Paul+Gilroy+on+Garvey&source=bl&ots=TgvZAsz18d&sig=U7oW7-LVzkLL9vi0Eyg-hYdvvn8&hl=en&ei=s-lxS6-mOoP-0gSil92kCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CAcQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=&f=false
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And again while I have the bit between my teeth woof woof he he he
THE EASIER APPROACH IS TO CRITIQUE THOSE WHO HAVE BEEN HISTORICALLY THE VICTIMS OF STATE TERRORISM THAN THE STATE. And this is in my view one of the unfortunate implications of the Gilroy Black Fascism project
Against Race is not just a set of discursive positions but a very specific set of practices. It challenges the philosophy of “race” as a formation BUT IT LEAVES IN TACT THE VERY HIERARCHY OF RACIAL OPRESSION AND RACIAL STRUCTURING.
For while Gilroy cites a version of Fanon in which Fanon was mindful of rigid identitarian positions, HIS WORK DOES NOT SIMILARLY CARRY THE ACTUAL ANTI-COLONIALIST PRACTICES OF FANON of that generation of Afro-Caribbean activists in London (whose children are now like Gilroy ambiguously ‘Black British’).
As I say, and keep saying its all about the ‘perspectives’
http://www.jendajournal.com/vol2.1/cbdavies.html
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With regard to the issue of facism my view of it is a state as represented by an individual whose interest is to oppress another nation.
I thought as much. That’s not fascism, J, that’s an expansionist dictatorship.
So to begin with, you apparently are very foggy on what fascism is, which makes me wonder how you can criticize Gilroy’s view on it.
Let’s put a few principles of fascism down on the screen here, shall we?
1) Fascism presumes that a people’s interests are, in fact, the natural interests of an individual.
2) It presumes that a people have a homogenous interest and that dissension against this interest is treason.
3) It presumes that “peopleness” is carried in the blood – i.e. that one is born into a people and that said people’s essence is transferred into one at one’s birth.
4) It presumes that a people = a land = a nation. That people’s have a “natural” land which si rigtfully theirs and no others.
5) The core motiff of fascism is the fasci, a bundle of sticks bound together, used to represent unity in homogeneity.
6) A true fascist believes that his people is locked in a life-or-death evolutionary struggle with all other peoples and that loyalty to one’s people should be the highest human value.
Davies’ critique of Gilroy, by the way, is selectively amnesiac. Gilroy’s main argument regarding the similarities between black nationalist thought and the roots of fascim is most certainly not based on “parades and fashion” but based on philosophy. And he doesn’t end it with Garvey, but also shows what has happened when certain black fascists – many of them supposed pn-africans – have come to power. Real power. I’m sure I don’t have to mention names if you are, indeed, a scholar of African history.
Furthemore, Gilroy does not reject pan-africanism: he feels it should be conducted with a diasporicx outlook that emphasizes diversities and discontinutities.
Finally, for a man who is apparently so leary of socialism, I find it ironic that the best critic of Gilroy you could google up was a communist. 😀
J, read Gilroy and draw your own conclusions. His analysis is not superficial can’t be summed up in a few clever bon mots as Davies is attempting to do. I’d be much more impressed if you actually engaged with the man’s thoughts on your own instead of cutting and pasting a very shallow third-person critique of them.
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Now, you ask why I don’t think that you’re exclusively African-centered? J, you use so many core concepts that came out of areas other than Africa – including the language you right in – that you’d be a fool to claim anything else.
Also, it seems to me – going on what you’ve said so far, mind – that your “Africa” is a bit of a romantic reconstruction and not a living, breathing place full of diversities and contradictions.
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Why do you continuously assume what people know here,
or as the case maybe what they do not know??
There is a kind of haughtiness in your dialogue which is not becoming for a teacher in my opinion, and in my humble opinion one must worry for the students since they will obviously lack any humility – and paradoxically this i how you begin to learn
If you honestly believe Garvey is a ‘Black Fascist’ which would be the appropriate term because Fascism is a Euro-centred ideology – then so be it.
And with regard to Facism, I gave a real historical example
of a Fascist society/country, (Italy) with a Fascist dictator (Mussolini) and how they/he treated an inferior set of people (Black/Africans/Ethiopians) in his/their eyes with genocide etc.
So I don’t understand your point??
I would also like to add speaking of historical information. I already mentioned that the idea of Garvey being a fascist did not originate with Gilroy.
Did you not read in the link where it stated Gilroy used this idea from CLR James, even though CLR no longer believed it to be true in his later years, and Gilroy in his non-African centredness conveniently ignored this point??
Finally with regard to Davies analysis of Gilroy, we have come full circle. Its is in keeping with the African centred /Black Nationalist ‘perspective’ of Gilroy. Absolutely no different to what I said about him NOT being ‘African centred’ and a man of ‘race first’ principle.
A position which you are opposed to…
Why can’t you just ‘accept’ the African centred perspective is a different ideology to your own??
Personally I think the discussion we are in fact having is revealing more about you the person, your political ideologies, racial dreams etc than it is in relaying ‘objective information’ about Garvey. Since the more evidence that is brought before the table. You become more entrenched in your views, but you do not have any scholarly arguments to critique the points that are raised (as in the Davies link).
As I said this is fine – but only unless you are confident in what you believe…
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Why do you continuously assume what people know here,
or as the case maybe what they do not know??
C’mon, J! Give me a break here! I flat out ASKED you what you know about fascism and you give me the definition of an imperialistic dictatorship. It’s pretty clear, then, that you are a bit confused on the issue of what fascism is.
I didn’t assume: I ASKED! 😀
There is a kind of haughtiness in your dialogue which is not becoming for a teacher in my opinion, and in my humble opinion one must worry for the students since they will obviously lack any humility – and paradoxically this i how you begin to learn.
Well, we just have to disagree there. Teachers need to be humble AND arrogant.
As one of my best teachers said: “I pick on you because you know how to defend yourself and if you’re going to go around believing the things you do, you’d BETTER know how to defend yourself better.”
I try to be humble and nice with people who are ignorant. It’s no fault of their own. With people who SHOULD know better – because they obviously have the brains to know better and have access to arguments which will allow them to know better – I am not humble. I am arrogant because intellectual laziness can’t be combated with humility.
If you want to yank Gilroy’s chain, for example, J, there are plenty of decent ways of doing it. Googling up some black marxist academic who’s doing a superficial drive-by on the man isn’t the way to go. And when you take that sort of rhetorical cop out, you should expect to get a raspberry from any competent teacher.
Not that I’m casting myself in the role as teacher here, mind: those are your words. To me, this is a dialogue in the very classic sense of the term.
Now, back to fascism:
I gave a real historical example
of a Fascist society/country, (Italy) with a Fascist dictator (Mussolini) and how they/he treated an inferior set of people (Black/Africans/Ethiopians) in his/their eyes with genocide etc.
Yes, I know. That’s the problem: you DIDN’T understand my point.
You’re confusing Mussolini’s IMPERIALISM with fascism. There are plenty of countries that have invaded other countries and killed their people under the leadership of a strongman. Not all of these countries are fascist. And there are plenty of ways in situating one people as “inferior” to another and not all of these imply fascism.
It seems to me that you think of “fascism” as a synonym for “political evil”. Mussolini, a self-professed fascist and a politically evil man, becomes the epitome of fascism to you. Everything Mussolini did needs must be fascist in orientation and anyone who acts like Mussolini must ipso facto be a fascist.
But this may be news to you, Africa-centered though you strive to be: Italy did not invade Ethiopia under Mussolini’s regime alone. They’d tried it before and failed. Italy’s attempt to dominate Ethiopia was thus not about fascism, but about good ol´European imperialism and racism.
Now, you could claim that imperialism and racism are important components of fascism and you’d be right. But they are not in and of themselves sufficient to qualify a state as fascist. The U.S. is imperialist and racist but not (yet) fascist.
As the fasci symbol implies, the key value of fascism is the subsumption of the individual into the homogenous national whole. Unity at all costs. It really can’t get any clearer than that.
Now, when Gilroy speaks of fascism, THAT’S the fascism he’s talking about. And note that he does not call Garvey fascist: your paladin Davies accuses him of that, but it simply is not true.
What Gilroy says is that both Garvey’s philosophy and the philosophy of fascism draw on some of the same roots and modes of organization: scientific racism for one. As a socialist and a afro-centric diasporist, he has very serious doubts as to whether such a philosophy can ultimately do anything other than further enchain black people.
Another point your friend Davies apparently didn’t get in Gilroy’s book: he’s perfectly aware that what Beatty has labled “black fascism” does bring immediate returns in terms of black political organization and self-esteem. What he finds tragic is that these sort of politics ultimately reinforce racism. In Garvey’s case, for example, there was nothing that white racists would have loved MORE than “Blacks back to Africa”, as “obviously” blacks could never be “real” citizens of the country they built.
As for their being no evidence to refute Davies’ views, that there is in abundance and I’ve pointed it out here: Gilroy does not call Garvey a fascist; to the degree that Gilroy believes that there is a black fascism, he does not believe that it is based on “parades and fashion”, as Davies would have it, but on real power; Gilroy does not dismiss pan-african political organization, he questions its inherent romanticism and militarism.
Hell, the proof of these points is even in the quotes that Davies brings up. Look at this one (from Gilroy):
…it is, however, to entertain the possibility of a profound kinship between the UNIA and the fascist political movements of the period in which it grew. These affinities can be approached via the idea of a common political style that usefully shades simplistic distinctions between ideology on the one hand and organizational strategies on the other.
Now, it’s pretty obvious there that Gilroy’s talking about afinities and shared philosophies, not classifying Garvey as fascist.
But this is where your Googling does you no good service, J. For if you went directly to the source, Gilroy himself, you’d quickly discover that Davies is manipulating your ass with rhetoric. If you’d read the sentance before the one she quotes, you’d see it says:
“This is not to undermine any of the historic and important achievements of the Garvey movement…”
…And if you continued your reading of Gilroy, you’d see he quotes Garvey himself (and completely in context) as saying:
We were the first fascists…. Mussolini copied fascism from me.
…Gilroy then goes on to state that the point at issue isn’t whether Garvey’s claims were true but to what it means for us today that Garvey BELIEVED them to be true. What it means, according to Gilroy, is that we’ve been given a legacy of black nationalist thought which believes that racial purity and standardization have to be fabricated, through force if necessary. Ulitmately, he sees it as legating black political thought with the belief that homogenized mass political solutions can and should be imposed on black people from above via a small elite cadre.
This, of course, is one of the problems the post World War II revolutionary left has had in general, but it is one which had particularly deadly consequences for the Black Panthers and their several armed off-shoots.
So I dunno what more you want by way of “proof”, J. I mean, do you really want me to go through Davies point by point and show how she manipulates Gilroy in order to have him saying things he never said, but which makes her black revolutionary take on the man look good?
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Thanks!!
There you go again assuming what I may or not know about Italy invading Ethiopia etc.
Anyone who knows Regage music deeply would often hear Rastafarians sing about the battle of Adwa (189?). ie Italy v Ethiopia war
I just cannot get my head around your condescending and paternalistic tone in our discussion- and I am sure it must be something you adopt in front of your students. You in part already admit to and concede to it.
Has it not occurred to you that I am already aware of Paul Gilroy’s thoughts and ideas – but I do not agree with it. And the reason I do disagree with it is because it is not ‘African centred’.
Long before this post I informed your wife that one has to be aware of Paul Gilroy’s politics, in the post ‘Black Brazil in the Gringo Gaze’. So you are wrong to suggest I merely googled a search for a critique of Gilroy.
Since we are on Fanon…Paul Gilroy is bi-racial, his mother is English. Personally and in my humble opinion he is that ‘Black-Skin White Masks figure that Fanon is referring to in his book. Though I am sure Mr. Gilroy would argue otherwise…
Finally when Mussolini came with the idea to drop mustard gas on Black people who he viewed as inferior and worthy of extermination…This is fascism …Imperialism here is too kind a word in this instance.
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There you go again assuming what I may or not know about Italy invading Ethiopia etc.
You believe that it is out of line that I think you should know about Italy’s first invasion of Ethiopia, given that you seem to think this sort of thing was a defining characteristic of fascism?
Frankly, that’s not an assumption, J, that’s a statement. You SHOULD know about this history if you’re an African-centered scholar. Whether you do or not… well, I make no assumptions there.
Now, if you do indeed know about this, why would you make the presumption that the second invasion of Ethiopia was characteristically a product of fascism – a defining characteristic of fascism, in fact, in your terms?
You don’t like people to assume things, but your statements beg these questions, J.
Has it not occurred to you that I am already aware of Paul Gilroy’s thoughts and ideas – but I do not agree with it.
It occurred to me. But given the fact that you can’t seem to even correctly describe what Gilroy’s ideas are, using the words of a superficial third party analysis which distorts them out of context, then I think it is a pretty safe assumption that you have not actually READ Gilroy and do not understand his point.
Now if you have read Gilroy, why would you point to Davies’ article as a good analysis of his thoughts, given that it’s in fact a complete distortion, given that Davies’ doesn’t even do readers the courtesy of correctly quoting the man?
To me, that`s sloppy and superficial thinking and I see you clinging to that “I’m afrocentric” bit as a general excuse for your sloppy thinking.
Be as afrocentric as you want. When you or your intellectual paladins claim that Gilroy is saying that Mussolini and Garvey were one and the same thing, you are simply, provably wrong.
What it comes down to, J, is this: you have not read Gilroy. You parody his arguments, you do not engage with them.
Being Afrocentric doesn’t get you out of that hole. Ana didn’t respond to your rather condescending assumption that she didn’t understand Gilroy’s politics because she understands them a hell of a lot better than you do. Why should she dialogue with someone who hasn’t even read word one of what a man says, but presumes to know everything about his views, especially when Ana HAS INDEED read Gilroy, backwards and forwards?
I, on the other hand, have much more patience when it comes to dealing with this sort of thing.
As for Italians killing Ethiopians and that being fascist… please. Again, you show you simply don’t understand the meaning of the term. Genocide is not a necessary or sufficient component of fascism. Non-fascist states have engaged in genocide and there have been fascist states which haven’t (Franco’s Spain and Peron’s Argentina spring to mind). While I might agree that genocide is more LIKELY under fascism than, say, under certain other systems, it’s not a defining characteristic of fascism.
It surprises me, with you being so concerned about politics, that you have a very hard time defining one of the 20th century’s main political philosophies, sticking to sort of a Hollywood version of it. I mean, c’mon, J! Your analysis seems to be “fascists kill and therefore anyone who kills is a fascist”.
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I do not understand…any of this. So I will ignore much of what you say and try to stick to the argument.
If I remember correctly was it not you who were referring to
an an Ad hominem: an argument that attacks the person who holds a view or advances an argument, rather than commenting on the view or responding to the argument.
So on I go, with my regard to the activities of Italy in Ethiopia as being fascist
Here are the links:
1. Italian FACIST War Crimes in Ethiopia
Click to access 6.1pankhurst.pdf
2. The FACIST invasion of Abyssinia
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=8713
3. The Italian FACIST invasion of Ethiopia
http://www.searchlightmagazine.com/index.php?link=template&story=148
4. Legacy of Bitterness: Ethiopia and Fascist Italy, 1935-1941 (Paperback)
5. During its 1935-’41 occupation of Ethiopia, Fascist Italy, supported by the Vatican, committed the crime of genocide against the Ethiopian people with poisonous gas sprayed from airplanes and other horrific atrocities, while the Vatican remained “conspicuously silent.”
http://www.gopetition.com/petitions/vatican-apology-for-ethiopian-holocaust.html
6. On this day in 1935 Fascist Italy Invaded Ethiopia
http://nazret.com/blog/index.php?c=1&more=1&pb=1&tb=1&title=on_this_day_in_1935_fascist_italy_invade
So there we have it, the very evidence which you are trying to deny.
Finally I have read Gilroy even before he was known by the public, I have heard him on radio and he used to teach in a University in the same city where I live.
In fact we share and exist in the same culture space – So please do not be arrogant.
If one wants to take the higher ground, I can easily say your wife is reading Gilroy out of a book, whereas I am actually living his reality from the book – So what does it prove?
1. Italian Facist War Crimes in Ethiopia
Click to access 6.1pankhurst.pdf
2. The fascist invasion of Abyssinia
http://www.socialistworker.co.uk/art.php?id=8713
3.
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Life can be arduous for some ha ha ha…And on I go with this list… (I thought I would give you guys a break – but I am back now) ha ha ha
7. The Italo-Abyinnian War
The League of Nations did little to stop Italy from doing this (ie invading Ethiopia). This was a victory for fascism and Italy as well
http://departments.kings.edu/history/20c/fascism.html#The Italo-Abyinnian War
8. In all, Mussolini’s twenty-year-long Fascist dictatorship was responsible for about a million premature deaths. Some 3,000 Italians died in the political disturbances occasioned by Fascism’s rise. Further casualties resulted from the regime’s malign domestic policies which, Party rhetoric notwithstanding, favoured the rich over the poor, urban dwellers over the peasantry and men over women. But the major killing fields of the regime were in its empire and in the various wars it aggressively waged. While ‘restoring order’ in Libya, the regime allowed 50,000 to die in camps and generally did nothing to halt the appalling decline of the Libyan population, which had fallen from some 1.2 million on Italy’s invasion in 1911 to 800,000 by the mid-1930s. Italian historians have never bothered to tally the death toll produced by the invasion and subsequent annexation of Ethiopia from 1935-41, but Ethiopians estimate that between 300,000 and 600,000 perished.
http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-5034292/Coming-to-terms-with-Fascism.html
9. GLOBAL ALLIANCE FOR JUSTICE: THE ETHIOPIAN CAUSE
The Fascist Genocide of Ethiopian People 1935 – 1941
10. Pursuant to the International Genocide Convention and the Declaration of Human Rights, and on behalf of the victims and survivors of the Ethiopian Genocide of 1935-1941, the Global Alliance for Justice – the Ethiopian cause seeks an apology from the Vatican along with acknowledgement, equity, justice, and fair compensation for the Ethiopian people from all concerned, and for the UN to rightfully include the genocide of the Ethiopian people in the annals of its historical genocide records and archives, in order that this long-ignored and untold story may be preserved, for a future world humanity.
“The FASCIST intent was to exterminate all life in Ethiopia.”
HIM Emperor Haile Selassie I, June 30, 1936
http://www.globalallianceforethiopia.org/
11. Mussolini’s Follies: Fascism in Its Imperial and Racist Phase, 1935–1940
Yet from 1935 to 1940 the Fascist regime shifted enormous amounts of money and effort to create a new Fascist colonial society
http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayAbstract;jsessionid=65DBAA385EA13ADB3FD62A83687BACB4.tomcat1?fromPage=online&aid=228759
12. The military aggression so inherent in fascist philosophy exploded in the Italian invasion (1935) of Ethiopia, the attack (1936
http://education.yahoo.com/reference/encyclopedia/entry/fascism
13. Pro-Fascist Italian-language radio programs for Italian Americans were broadcast both from Italy and commercial stations in the United States. After a late start in 1930, they intensified at the time of the Italo-Ethiopian War in 1935-1936
http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a785041739&db=all
14. Mr. Whitaker correctly points out that legality or human decency does not affect people drunk with power. Today the United Nations, like its predecessor, the League of Nations, has become a toothless tiger and an instrument of states with military and economic power. In 1935, The League ignored Emperor Haile Selassie’s plea on behalf of a charter member state, to stop Fascist Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia and the annihilation of her people from 1935 to 1941.
And the list goes on but I will leave it there.
Hopefully, this will clarify that others academic have viewed Italian fascism vis-a-vis Ethiopia.
Moreover, I would add that this can in no way be compared to what Marcus Garvey did for Blacks across the world.
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With regard to some of the issues raised in my discussion here. There were some issues that I wanted to comment upon but I decided not to because it would confuse and bring more points to the table than ever.
Here are a few thoughts:
1. Furthemore, Gilroy does not reject pan-africanism. There are loads of differing concepts of Pan-Africanism of which Garvey is merely one strand amongst a myriad. This was alluded to in the previous post on Fanon
2. What Gilroy says is that both Garvey’s philosophy and the philosophy of fascism draw on some of the same roots and modes of organization: scientific racism – from an African centred perspective G
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With regard to some of the issues raised in my discussion here. There were some issues that I wanted to comment upon but I decided not to because it would confuse and bring more points to the table than ever.
Here are a few thoughts:
1. Furthemore, Gilroy does not reject pan-africanism. There are loads of differing concepts of Pan-Africanism of which Garvey is merely one strand amongst a myriad. This was alluded to in the previous post on Fanon
2. What Gilroy says is that both Garvey’s philosophy and the philosophy of fascism draw on some of the same roots and modes of organization: scientific racism – from an African centred perspective Garveyism is not based on racism. Garvey is usally viewed as racist by White ‘euro-centred scholars’ o even ‘Black-Skin, White masked’ ones like Gilroy in my humble opinion. This is their perception of him, and hence the reason why they can make the comparison to another White facist (ie Mussolini).
3. Genocide is not a necessary or sufficient component of fascism. Non-fascist states have engaged in genocide and there have been fascist states which haven’t (Franco’s Spain and Peron’s Argentina spring to mind). I cannot speak of Argentina’s situation. I can say you are wrong for Franco’s Spain
“A social movement has been growing in Spain, breaking the 30-year pact of silence on the enormous atrocities and genocide carried out during and after the fascist coup led by General Franco. The coup took place in 1936 with the active support of the Catholic Church and the Spanish Army, and made possible by the assistance of Hitler and Mussolini and the cowardice of the western democracies, including the U.S…”
Notwithstanding the linguistic and cultural genocide waged against the Catalan people
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With regard to Gilroy, and this is just my view of what I see happens in London
He was a ‘low -key’ academic within teh University. His first book that I became aware of was ‘There Ain’t No Black in the Union Jack’. The title of teh book says it all. And from the little I can remember about the book it was more ‘radical’.
However, with his book the ‘Black Atlantic’. This is where he became popular with the ‘mainstream’. I can’t remember much about this book but it suggests that Black people identity comes out of the ‘Black Atlantic’ slavery experience.
African centred academics and Black activist felt this was too narrow and ‘euro centred’.
However, what tends to happen in London, if any Black author wants to make a name for himself/herself. All they have to do is write something controversial or which is the anti-thesis of Black radical thought and the British mainstream and academia will run with the concept.
For me this is how the world as such got to know Gilroy.
And the rest is just history.
However, I still advocate that Gilroy view on race is shaped by his bi-racial heritage. This is in no way to discredit the man or his family.
However, it is an opinion of mine that one’s ‘existence’ (ie ‘ontology’) can predicate the philosophy which one holds…
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J, I’m beginning to see a pattern here.
When someone gives you a very clear description of their views, you will suddenly cease to understand them if said views contradict your opinion. In fact, the clearer the description, the greater your confusion will be.
Given this, I’m going to resume my main points as clearly as possible and see if this doesn’t drive you into utter bewilderment.
1) Fascism is a political philosophy. As it’s name implies, it is based on the idea of absolute, homogenous unity: the subsumption of the individual into the national or racial whole.
2) Militarism, imperialism, racism and even genocide are not necessary characteristics of fascism. Non-fascist systems have practiced all of these.
3) Where it touches the question of Garvey and his role as a possible black fascist (if you recall, the original point of this debate), what Paul Gilroy is talking about is the classic philosophical definition of fascism, which I have given in #1 above.
4) Gilroy’s point regarding Garvey and fascism is not that Garvey is fascist.
5) Gilroy believes that both Garvey and fascism draw from a common set of early 20th century notions regarding peoples, races and modernity.
6) Gilroy questions whether or not certain parts of Garvey’s legacy are healthy for today’s black movements. In particular, he does not go for the belief that mass, homogenous political movements should be organized from the top down by a small, elite vanguardist cadre. THIS is the main characteristic that both Garvey’s movement and fascism have in common and which has permeated much of black nationalist and africanist thought since then.
7) While far from being an “Africanist” in your understanding of the word, Gilroy is hardly turning his back on the African descendent peoples of the worl, as you implied with your statement that he seemed to be a good example of Fanon’s “black who wants to be white”.
8) Gilroy is a diasporist. He believes that the ways of black living in the world are many and diverse and that this diversity is what gives the diaspora its power. He believes this should be respected. He is thus very leary of any “Africanist” philosophy which tries to cast black people as a homogenous group with identical political and cultural interests.
So those are the main points which are pertinent to our discussion of Gilroy, Garvey and black fascism.
Now, on a personal level, I’ll add the following:
9) Despite your anger regarding my “presumptions” about what you know, it’s pretty obvious that you’ve never read Gilroy and that you are, in fact, simply mouthing criticsms about him that you picked up off of the internet. When one googles “Paul Gilroy black fascism”, Davies’ article is the first substantial critique up off the screen. You don’t even know what the man’s key ideas are, and yet you’re lecturing Ana and I on what his politics supposedly are? And YOU want to complain about intellectual arrogance, J? 😀 😀
10) Frankly, I doubt you ever heard about Paul Gilroy until you logged on here and saw me mention his work. 😀
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So please kindly tell me where you first mentioned Gilroy??
And secondly I would like to carry us back full circle, to what actually caused this discussion
You started the debate with:
On Tue 9 Feb 2010 at 13:49:46
J, dead serious question here.
Philosophically speaking, how is Marcus Garvey’s ” ‘Up Mighty Race!’ We have to carry out our rightful heritage…” different from classical fascism, in any way, shape or form?
and in your last post you say:
“Gilroy’s point regarding Garvey and fascism is not that Garvey is fascist.”
However, this was not your original position, as seen by the question you ask. You even add the word ‘classical’ to denote a difference between it and other forms.
So my point is that White Euro-centred scholars will try to villify Garvey by comparing him to the archetypal White man of evil, who Western civilization views nearer to the ‘devil’ ie Mussolini and fascism, with Hitler way out in front).
If Marcus Garvey is to be vilified or critiqued it will be from an African centred perspective, which would be in keeping with his line of thought
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How is Ch 2 coming along please??
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I really don’t like it when people change their accent when speaking. To me, that shows that that person is fake. I have white men do that to me, suddenly switching to a “lower class” Boston or something accent thinking I’ll feel unity with them or something. They don’t understand that just because I’m a person of color doesn’t mean I feel any special unity with lower class white people, especially with east coast accents that I never hear except on TV. Plus, even though I’m poor now, I grew up middle class so their assuming I was always poor just shows me their stereotypes of people of color.
I’ve also had people of color switch accents on me. One Nuyorican instructor in college always spoke with a thick ass kind of Black accent in class, but after I turned in a short story based on my life in her class she talked to me one day and suddenly switched to a plain California accent like my own. I was like, ok which is the real her?
I had a Palestinian American girl in a poetry class who would speak with a Black kind of accent especially when reading her poetry, but the next semester I had a Gender in the Middle East class with her and in class she would speak with a California accent.
I don’t know if “Black kind of accent” is a good description since Black women don’t really sound like that, but I don’t know how else to describe it. Maybe “trying to be Black”.
I had a white professor assume I was Russian and start speaking to me in a Russian accent…
I’ll change my register based on how formal I feel I have to be, but I always speak in the same accent.
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